[UPDATED:] Very promising early vote numbers in Franklin and Cuyahoga County

Mike McDonald has the story on Huffington Postabout Ohio’s early vote totals:

“But something special is going on in two Ohio Democratic strongholds: Cuyahoga and Franklin counties.I track on this handy web page that other places around the country – including other Ohio counties – are so far reporting low single digit early voting rates. In stark contrast, over 112,000 votes have already been cast in these two Ohio counties. As a comparison, this represents over ten percent of all ballots cast in the 2006 election in these counties, with still some time to go.”

Over 112,000 registered Democrats have requested an early ballot already. That’s over 65k more than Republicans. But wait… according to the data, although 56% of the requested absentee ballots are by registered Democrats, 60% of the ballots already received are from registered Democrats. That means that, unlike the usual pattern, the Democrats in Cuyahoga County have a higher response rate on absentee requests than Republicans. Ted Strickland could get his “100,000 margin” on early votes alone.

[UPDATE:] This morning, the Columbus Dispatch reported that over half of the absentee requests and in-office ballots casts in the first week of early voting came from Franklin and Cuyahoga County alone.

As of yesterday in Franklin County, nearly 153,000 absentee ballots had been requested and 68,000 returned, according to the county elections board.

Ballot requests by Democrats slightly outnumber those by Republicans, and 56percent of the ballots issued to Democrats have been returned, compared with Republicans’ 52 percent.

John Kasich doesn’t likely have a path to victory without Franklin County, his home county, in his column. In the past month, we’ve seen Organizing for America turn Franklin County’s early vote from a slight GOP advantage to a slight, but growing, Democratic one.

Meanwhile in Hamilton County, here’s what a Democratic GOTV Coordinated Campaign event in Hamilton County two days ago looked like.

Wow. Both Cuyahoga and Franklin Counties look like they’re on pace to do as well on the Early Vote as 2006, if not better. And it looks like we’re going to kick ass and take names in Hamilton County, which Strickland did not win in 2006.